Autopsy Blues V GWS. Rant away folks....

[thylacine60]

Measured post, MB.

 

[mikeythemoocow]

No idea what he is being paid

$2.4 million per season

 

[Windhover]

Thanks Windy for your reply.
I wanted Ratten to see out his contract as well and then for us to have a go at Roos. The Club saw it a different way. I accept that.

I have no idea why our players have not brought into Mick's game plan. But when watching our players last year it appeared they were in 2 minds on where to go.
It appeared to me that they wanted to go one way but would go the other because they thought that was what the coach wanted.
Those times you mentioned when the game plan was 'thrown out' were times when I believe Mick said just back yourself.

First, a helpful poster indicates there is a limit to the number of "I's" that should in decency be used in a post and you have presumably neared this limit at least.

Secondly you suggest it is the players' fault that they have not bought into MM game plan. If so you are mistaken. It is for the coach to understand the players and explain the game plan he wants to use. If a player does not follow it, it is the player's fault and he gets dropped (i.e. Milne and Del Santo under Ross Lyon). If a whole team doesn't buy in it is the coach's problem.

This year we have performed worse (win/loss) but again I believe it is on the back of numerous players who are not fit or are out of form and we do not have anyone in the reserves pushing for selection. I do not believe we are playing the boundry line this year. I believe that Mick has adjusted and we are no longer hugging the boundry.

You may be right that MM has changed the game plan. To the extent you can explain it (except by saying what it isn't) the adjustment seems no better than the original and supports an inference that MM is either a ditherer or clueless or both. Strong coaches, like Roos, Lyon, Hinkley, C. Scott, Longmire seem to stick to their formulae.

I also believe that we are seeing improvements in the way our football department is structured and run ( Northern Blues playing a similar game to Carlton, being coached to the same game plans, player development is more visible to see etc). Yarran is playing consistently, Gibbs is playing better football, Cas is kicking with confidence etc.
There is a plan.
Being based in Canberra means that I can not see these things with my own eyes (other than FTA and internet) but we have reliable posters in Harker, MSR, HBF and others who do.

You are right to be grateful for the posts of those named in relation to training and inside club matters, Whether the supposed improvement has any on-field reality remains doubtful. Accepting the players you have named have shown some improvement under MM (Caz's kicking is a very recent thing and let's hope it lasts), there are a whole heap who have gone backwards: Lucas, Watson, McInnes, Bell and Garlett being 5 standout young players that might have expected to have improved naturally and have not.

On Daisy, I believe that his fitness levels have increased but he still lacks strength in his ankle. This will be rectified over the next preseason. I am happy with his acquision as he improves our team. He encourages, adds voice, is not a shrinking violet, trains hard, is not a 'soft c...' and livens up our playing group.
No idea what he is being paid but I do not believe that it is above $700K as purported in the media.

Sorry for the long winded response.

Let's not want to turn this into a bagging daisy chain but do you have any reason to know why he will gain strength in the ankle over the next preseason when 6 months of training/playing AFL hasn't fixed it.

Finally, your response is not as long-winded as others and, perhaps, more informative and balanced than most.

 

[MileHigh]

If it took him 6 months to work out we are mentally weak, and only now start addressing it, then we are in big trouble.
...BTW, This IS his 2nd year as Coach!

Trying reading things clearly before responding. Yes, it is his 2nd year as coach. I was referencing what he will be able to do at the END of his 2nd year.

You'd be looking at the game plan and getting that right as well as the list in the first year. You turn some players over, bring in new ones, then you have to deal with 21 players having surgery in the off season. You come up against the Cats and Hawks and you go bloody close both times, so you would suggest at that point the fitness is there or there abouts after having a really interrupted pre season as a club and as such a difficult start to the year. Then you come up against GWS and lose and then you go "ok, somethings not right here", and then you fix that.

The knee jerk supporters come out and call for the coaches head after 1.5 seasons and as per usual as some dimwit above (Windhover) wants to go compare us to Hinkley and suggest that MM should also be able to turn everything around in the same amount of time. They have had better recruiting in the years prior and have a better development team. You can only do what you have with the resources in place. We have talked extensively about the recruiting over the past 5 years, and when you compare that to Port who bottomed right out, and in doing so secured some seriously good talent, coupled with probably having a better development department, they have the ingredients to see a steep increase in their ability as a club.

If Blue Tongue and Windhover had their way we would have fired MM after our 0-4 start. You look at the result and you don't look at what is behind it. Compare the 21 off season surgeries with the 18 the Hawks had after their premiership in 2008 which saw them slip down to 9th in 2009, and you have some pretty good evidence we went through the same thing this year. We didnt finish 1st in 2013 though, we finished 9th, so when you slip from there, we are about where we are supposed to be.

Daisy Thomas played the first 6 games out of necessity as we simply didnt have the players to put on the field. But of course everyone criticises him for not performing and that we spent €700k on a dud. He wasn't supposed to come in to play until at least round 7, but these types of supporters dont do their research and just knee jerk their responses that we wasted our money and blah blah blah. The club and Daisy knew they weren't to expect much from him at the start. Internally they where they are and whats going on, but if you are just going to base everything on the result and not look into things further then you are as ignorant as an American who flicks on the news and believes they are the greatest country in the world.

 

[The_Wookie]

 

[Windhover]

Trying reading things clearly before responding. Yes, it is his 2nd year as coach. I was referencing what he will be able to do at the END of his 2nd year.

You might do well to heed your own advice (about which more later) but what do you think MM "will be able to do at the end of his 2nd year. Give us your objective standard for MM that we can measure him against (and my prediction, were you to do so, is that we will all be able to beat him over the head with it when he fails in whatever time-frame you set in the future.

The knee jerk supporters come out and call for the coaches head after 1.5 seasons . . .. .

Ok I admit 1.5 seasons of sustained crap (nearly 2 years actually) is a bit of a knee jerk. What do you reckon is a measured response? We wait 10 years of sustained crap to see how everything is going?

. . . and as per usual as some dimwit above (Windhover) wants to go compare us to Hinkley and suggest that MM should also be able to turn everything around in the same amount of time. They have had better recruiting in the years prior and have a better development team. You can only do what you have with the resources in place. We have talked extensively about the recruiting over the past 5 years, and when you compare that to Port who bottomed right out, and in doing so secured some seriously good talent, coupled with probably having a better development department, they have the ingredients to see a steep increase in their ability as a club.

You think Port had better recruiting and a better development team? You think that Hinkley just got lucky and that Primus did all the hard work? No, really? If so do you support going after Primus, because he is certainly available. Plus Port had Pearce and Chaplin walk out of this wonderful environment called Port at the end of 2012. This is what Robert Walls said at the start of the 2013 season about Port, predicting they would finish last:
[The Power is just about out in Adelaide. The club doesn't know what it stands for, its players want out and its become hard to attract good people to the club. new coach Ken Hinkley has his work cut out but his Geelong coaching experience will help. For a start he hasn't loaded the list with rejects from other clubs - after the Giants and the Suns, it is the youngest list. It will be a slow build to restore Power to respectibility.]

If Blue Tongue and Windhover had their way we would have fired MM after our 0-4 start. You look at the result and you don't look at what is behind it. Compare the 21 off season surgeries with the 18 the Hawks had after their premiership in 2008 which saw them slip down to 9th in 2009, and you have some pretty good evidence we went through the same thing this year. We didnt finish 1st in 2013 though, we finished 9th, so when you slip from there, we are about where we are supposed to be.

Since you have verballed me, it must be repeated: I do NOT support MM being fired, even now. I just ask that he drag his tired body out the door of the club and bid us farewell. Your apologia for MM (injuries and surgeries) is noted. Please try to make a coherent argument out of it.

Daisy Thomas played the first 6 games out of necessity as we simply didnt have the players to put on the field. But of course everyone criticises him for not performing and that we spent €700k on a dud. He wasn't supposed to come in to play until at least round 7, but these types of supporters dont do their research and just knee jerk their responses that we wasted our money and blah blah blah. The club and Daisy knew they weren't to expect much from him at the start. Internally they where they are and whats going on, but if you are just going to base everything on the result and not look into things further then you are as ignorant as an American who flicks on the news and believes they are the greatest country in the world.

Well, that is an interesting take. I see where we disagree. I do want to base everything on the result. You don't. Now I see why you are happy with our complete lack of progress under MM. [PS. There are many objective measures by which the US is the greatest country in the world: GDP, military strength, freedom of speech. But maybe I am as ignorant as the American.

 

[BlueTongue]

Trying reading things clearly before responding.

Err... Yeh. Maybe you should take heed of your own advice. I was being Sarcastic with my last post when I said "If it took him 6 months to work out we are mentally weak, and only now start addressing it, then we are in big trouble."

Meaning - I'm sure he realized our weaknesses long before the 6 month mark.

Yes, it is his 2nd year as coach. I was referencing what he will be able to do at the END of his 2nd year.

You'd be looking at the game plan and getting that right as well as the list in the first year. You turn some players over, bring in new ones, then you have to deal with 21 players having surgery in the off season. You come up against the Cats and Hawks and you go bloody close both times, so you would suggest at that point the fitness is there or there abouts after having a really interrupted pre season as a club and as such a difficult start to the year. Then you come up against GWS and lose and then you go "ok, somethings not right here", and then you fix that.

The knee jerk supporters come out and call for the coaches head after 1.5 seasons and as per usual as some dimwit above (Windhover) wants to go compare us to Hinkley and suggest that MM should also be able to turn everything around in the same amount of time. They have had better recruiting in the years prior and have a better development team. You can only do what you have with the resources in place. We have talked extensively about the recruiting over the past 5 years, and when you compare that to Port who bottomed right out, and in doing so secured some seriously good talent, coupled with probably having a better development department, they have the ingredients to see a steep increase in their ability as a club.

If Blue Tongue and Windhover had their way we would have fired MM after our 0-4 start. You look at the result and you don't look at what is behind it.

For the record, I believe one of the Major reasons MM was hired & Ratts was fired was that Mick knows the whole Footy Dept. top to bottom, and was put in place to sort out the shambles behind the scenes, if not as much then more than on-field. Coaching extending to having a say in the recruitment and mentoring the young blokes.

To be clear, I'm not knee-jerking (or jerking anything else for that matter), I'm betting on MM for the long haul.

Compare the 21 off season surgeries with the 18 the Hawks had after their premiership in 2008 which saw them slip down to 9th in 2009, and you have some pretty good evidence we went through the same thing this year. We didnt finish 1st in 2013 though, we finished 9th, so when you slip from there, we are about where we are supposed to be.

Disagree, Hawks recruit better and seem to get it together a lot faster. Maybe it's because they recruit people with good disposal. Up until MM, we've gone for in and under 'grunt' types with average to poor disposal. Case in Point - Look at the difference Menzel & Everitt have made already with their clean disposal. I'm not blaming injury - All teams have their fair share every year. Over all, teams like Port, North & WCE have just made more substantial and faster progress than us.

Daisy Thomas played the first 6 games out of necessity as we simply didnt have the players to put on the field. But of course everyone criticises him for not performing and that we spent €700k on a dud. He wasn't supposed to come in to play until at least round 7, but these types of supporters dont do their research and just knee jerk their responses that we wasted our money and blah blah blah. The club and Daisy knew they weren't to expect much from him at the start. Internally they where they are and whats going on, but if you are just going to base everything on the result and not look into things further then you are as ignorant as an American who flicks on the news and believes they are the greatest country in the world.

Blah Blah Blah, something about repeating the same mistakes and expecting different results being the definition of Insanity...
I'm not looking too hard at the results, I'm more interested in how we learn from them and address them.

 

[MileHigh]

You might do well to heed your own advice (about which more later) but what do you think MM "will be able to do at the end of his 2nd year. Give us your objective standard for MM that we can measure him against (and my prediction, were you to do so, is that we will all be able to beat him over the head with it when he fails in whatever time-frame you set in the future.

Ok I admit 1.5 seasons of sustained crap (nearly 2 years actually) is a bit of a knee jerk. What do you reckon is a measured response? We wait 10 years of sustained crap to see how everything is going?


You think Port had better recruiting and a better development team? You think that Hinkley just got lucky and that Primus did all the hard work? No, really? If so do you support going after Primus, because he is certainly available. Plus Port had Pearce and Chaplin walk out of this wonderful environment called Port at the end of 2012. This is what Robert Walls said at the start of the 2013 season about Port, predicting they would finish last:
[The Power is just about out in Adelaide. The club doesn't know what it stands for, its players want out and its become hard to attract good people to the club. new coach Ken Hinkley has his work cut out but his Geelong coaching experience will help. For a start he hasn't loaded the list with rejects from other clubs - after the Giants and the Suns, it is the youngest list. It will be a slow build to restore Power to respectibility.]



Since you have verballed me, it must be repeated: I do NOT support MM being fired, even now. I just ask that he drag his tired body out the door of the club and bid us farewell. Your apologia for MM (injuries and surgeries) is noted. Please try to make a coherent argument out of it.



Well, that is an interesting take. I see where we disagree. I do want to base everything on the result. You don't. Now I see why you are happy with our complete lack of progress under MM. [PS. There are many objective measures by which the US is the greatest country in the world: GDP, military strength, freedom of speech. But maybe I am as ignorant as the American.

I can see the way you want to pull my messages apart you want to argue this like a lawyer (and I fully suspect you are currently putting yourself through some law major), spouting the requirements for an objective assessment in a world that is anything but. You can measure things in a vacuum and its pointless trying to try and do so. You are trying to make things black and white when there is too many elements in play to argue this and you are too wound up in the end result when you need to get all the elements right (recruiting, list development, coaching staff, game plan, injuries and recovery, football department) right to be able to get the result.

A few short points as I haven't got time for this nonsense -

- Yes, Port DID have better recruiting due to ladder position and also have a better development team.
- 2012 - Pick 7, 29 & 30 (Oliver Wines) vs pick 11, 35 & 54 (Troy Menzel)
- 2011 - Pick 6, 45 & 51 (Chad Wingard) vs pick 22, 44 & 62 (Josh Bootsma)
- 2010 - Pick 16, 35 & 36 (Ben Jacobs) vs Pick 18, 34 & 42 (Matthew Watson)
- 2009 - Picks 8, 9 & 16 (John Butcher) vs picks 12, 43 & 59 (Kane Lucas)
- 2008 - Picks 4, 22 & 38 (Hamish Hartlett) vs picks 6, 40 & 65 (Chris Yarran)
(We have lower positions every year and chosen poorly with our lower picks, as well as 3 of our first picks.)

- I dont think Primus did all the hard work. You seem to the think the coach does everything. You realise there is a whole football department with other roles and the coach doesn't sit on a throne and tell his minions what to do? They were the fittest team last year for the start of the year before they fell away. This year they are sustaining it. That's development, not coaching. In addition they chose better with the selections they did have, we have seemingly squandered 3 of our last 5 1st round picks. Can't blame MM for that. You can't blame him for playing those guys over the past 1.5 seasons (that's around 35 games I would suspect by now) to work out who has what it takes and who doesn't. The same reason they didn't turn the list over when he came on board because he wanted to have a look at everyone to make those decisions as the head coach.

- We are closer to the half point of the season, not the end. Don't try and extend Micks tender to make it seem worse for the sake of your argument.

- Mick's time frame is 3 years. It will be at the end of his 3rd year that we judge him on, not for him to walk away after half of that and go "this is too hard and I am too old" or for the club to go "we want instant results and it isn't happening".

- If Mick was so bad, why has Gibbs and Yarran just signed on? So did Murph, so did Jamison. Seems to me if things were all so dire straights at the club these players would all be walking for greener pasture.

Fact is, internally they know where they are at and what's going on. You, you are a knee jerk supporter who want a coach to resign half way through his contract. You want us to look at Mick and the Blues objectively but want to compare everything to Port and Hinkley. Chalk and cheese mate. Micks identified now after having to look over a whole myriad of things (not just our mentality week to week) and has now established this is a problem that needs to be addressed. One thing at a time. This will be addressed, and as the other elements start to fall into place, and they are, this side will solidify and we will return up the ladder.

Pull my post apart, bold quotes, reference football pundits, whatever you feel the need to do to feel like you are in a court of law and you are trying to win a case. I haven't got time to respond further to this kind of panic button mentality and hysteria.

ENDS.

 

[blue gunslinger]

Would be a gutsy person to announce mick fired mid season
What mick says via the press v what mick says behind close doors to players and officials
Mick knows the press- I hazard a guess the 2 are a completely different set of conversations

 

[Windhover]

I can see the way you want to pull my messages apart you want to argue this like a lawyer (and I fully suspect you are currently putting yourself through some law major), spouting the requirements for an objective assessment in a world that is anything but. You can measure things in a vacuum and its pointless trying to try and do so. You are trying to make things black and white when there is too many elements in play to argue this and you are too wound up in the end result when you need to get all the elements right (recruiting, list development, coaching staff, game plan, injuries and recovery, football department) right to be able to get the result.

Pull my post apart, bold quotes, reference football pundits, whatever you feel the need to do to feel like you are in a court of law and you are trying to win a case. I haven't got time to respond further to this kind of panic button mentality and hysteria.

Fair enough. If when things settle down for you I would appreciate an answer to the questions posed in my post. (PS My posts might be "forensic" or they might be evidence of "hysteria" on my part but I fail to see how they could be both at the same time. Your criticisms, such as they are, reflect more on you - perhaps given your time-poor state - than they do on me. But that is only a comment in passing.)

 

[MileHigh]

Waite dropped. I will call this a bi-product of recognising who is not mentally showing up week-to-week. I have been critical on Waite in one of my previous posts saying that we can no longer afford to carry this guy as you don't see top 4 sides have players on their list who get a game every week based on potentially showing up and he needs to be dropped and seriously considered to be let go come seasons end. This type of player is cancerous amongst the playing group, and whilst its not at Fev levels, its not good. You cant get suspended, give away silly 50's and free kicks and not show up mentally week-to-week. They rest of the side is relying upon you and and when the rest of the 21 blokes are busting their gut to get it to you in the forward line and you are less than 100% committed, it sucks the energy out of everyone who takes the field and is giving it their all.

http://www.afl.com.au/news/2014-06-27/teams-round-15

Bit by bit MM is doing what is required. Im not saying Ratten was a bad coach at all and would have loved for him to have stayed on, however my main criticism of him was always that he wasnt willing to make the tough decisions and drop players when they werent performing. Hampson, Waite, Garlett, these guys all continued to get games when they weren't up to it.

This is a serious wake up call to Waite as its the 2nd time he has been dropped and as much as I love him when hes switched on, I fully back the club to move him on should they consider the need to come seasons end.

 

[ferrisb]

I could take up Russian Roulette if I want something less stressful.

Ah guys, there could be a 1/6 chance we need a new host for the upcoming podcasts...

 

[The Old Dark Navy's]

Ah guys, there could be a 1/6 chance we need a new host for the upcoming podcasts...

It's okay. The first chamber had the bullet but being a Carlton suppoirter .... I missed. Yup, fired it into my own temple and somehow shot my opponent who was 10 metres away.

 

[ferrisb]

It's okay. The first chamber had the bullet but being a Carlton suppoirter .... I missed. Yup, fired it into my own temple and somehow shot my opponent who was 10 metres away.

Hmmmm, probably landed at his feet...